Thursday, 28 October 2010

The Cape Town Commitment: A Declaration of Belief and a Call to Action (Part 1)

The Third Lausanne Congress on World Evangelization closed last Sunday in Cape Town. Said to be perhaps the widest and most diverse gathering of Christians ever held in the history of the church, it drew 4,000 selected participants from 198 nations. Its reach was also extended into over 650 GlobaLink sites in 91 countries, drawing 100,000 unique visits to its website from 185 countries during the week of the Congress.

Over the last year, Chris Wright and team of theologians from around the world have worked to shape The Cape Town Commitment – a declaration of belief and a call to action. When completed, it will be a two-part document. The draft of part 1, ‘What We Believe’, is already available here; part 2, which will be a call to action arising from the listening process at the Congress, is expected to be finished by December.

The statement in part 1 is framed around the word ‘love’, the language of covenant, as follows: